I would be wary of running 18 lands when you want to make 3-4 land drops for the Drakes (and maybe hardcasting a Phoenix), but the math actually doesn't look that bad, assuming I have half a clue what I'm doing (not guaranteed, btw). At 16 cantrips, 8 of which can dig 2 deep, you dig 1.5 deep per average cantrip. At 20 lands, lands are 1/3 of the deck, so at 18 lands two cantrips is equal to a bit less than 1 land (when you want to find a land, at least). Jump-start gives you a little bit more digging power than the numbers reflect, so call it even.
That would suggest that the deck is fine for lands, since I just estimated 18+(16/2) = 26 land equivalents. You also need to get lands in your opener, and you need to hit two land drops before you can even start casting Radical Idea and Chart a Course. But Frank Karsten estimated that 18 lands gives you 97% probability of finding your first two land drops (with proper mulligan strategy and scry). Having 8 1-mana cantrips helps even more. Hitting the 3rd at 90% or more needs 22 lands (or 25 on the play) according to his calculations, but you should have all the cantrips online by turn two.
So the question may be, are you OK with spending the first 2 turns digging for lands with cantrips? I suspect yes, since those cantrips feed the Drakes. How's it working in testing?
The Karsten numbers are a little misleading at the low land count end. Remember he's assuming you mulligan any 1 lander until you hit 5. So the 97% means that if you mulligan all your 1-landers and your five card no-landers then you will hit 2 lands on turn two 97% of the time. However, you will be playing with 6 or with 5 a lot more often than the more land heavy decks.
I've been happy with 21. It's possible to feel flooded but with all the hand shaping going on it's usually not too bad.
Also, some evidence for the explosiveness of this deck. This is the board state during my opponent's turn the turn before they conceded:
That's a 9/7 Lyra and a 4/7 Aurelia standing in front of an Ajani that's close to ultimate. Opponent attacked with Lyra and I chumped to make the life score 20-29. Then I drew Discovery and used it to find Beacon Bolt. Beacon Bolt took down both angels and put my Phoenix in the yard, both Phoenixes came back and together with the Electromancer took down Ajani.
I'd like to ask people that plays firemind's research what this card is here for ? I have tried it and found it pretty bad. If it is for teferi match-up why the hell are you not playing Niv-Mizzet instead ? Only match-up where the card is better than niv-mizzet is against UBx surveil/discard with elder reborn which is already a good match-up. Same goes for some lists with fight with fire over beacon bolt, i can't imagine a world where i would want to do that, beacon bolt is bonkers in this pack. Interested in seeing more mission brefing but it will need to bend the mana base to play more blue. If only there was a second one mana blue cantrip legal^^
Not surprised to see the deck showing good results the deck is really strong even if the versions that showed at the GPs are the bad ones (enigma drake+velocity is cute but it makes your whole deck weaker, playing more cheap cantrips and less lands is better).
This is my current decklist, might try murmuring mystic for the mirror as long as people can't give trample+first strike to their drakes. And about the lands debate, i sometimes cut a land after sideboard when i cut the drakes but the deck can and will usually use any mana avaible at every turn of the game so hitting land drop every turn is good. Sure you will sometimes draw too many lands but beeing stuck on 3 lands on turn 3 and 4 is not what you wanna do, you'll need 6 mana on turn 6 if you have no electromancer to play radical idea and chart a course, for 5 mana you can go electromancer and 3 two mana spells so you want lands the whole game.
I'd like to ask people that plays firemind's research what this card is here for ? I have tried it and found it pretty bad. If it is for teferi match-up why the hell are you not playing Niv-Mizzet instead ? Only match-up where the card is better than niv-mizzet is against UBx surveil/discard with elder reborn which is already a good match-up. Same goes for some lists with fight with fire over beacon bolt, i can't imagine a world where i would want to do that, beacon bolt is bonkers in this pack. Interested in seeing more mission brefing but it will need to bend the mana base to play more blue. If only there was a second one mana blue cantrip legal^^
Fight with Fire is in the side for the matchups where you are stone cold certain you will be facing 5 toughness creatures that need to die, especially Niv-Mizzet. This deck will usually get up to five in the yard for beacon bolt, but usually isn't always. Staring at a Niv-Mizzet on the board and your Beacon Bolt in hand with only three or four instants in the yard feels pretty bad. In a longer game this deck can also kick it more often than you'd think.
I agree that Firemind's Research is suspect. It's horrible off the top. Even if you land it on turn two I'd say it's good, not great. If you want that effect I'd just play Search for Azcanta.
Mission Briefing is definitely worth a look. I find the deck works better when you don't sell out to try to live the turn three dream anyway. I'm already trying to get as much blue mana out there as possible.
Win rate with this deck continues to be nuts. Another 4-1 and a 5-0 today. I'm up in the first page on the trophy count, which is a first for me.
Drakes also showed up as a decent portion of the GP metagame and had top 8 appearances in both Lille and New Jersey. Both of the top 8 decks featured Enigma Drake over Discovery. Might be an indicator of where the deck is going.
Since it looks like the deck has some legs I'll work on editing the original post to be more primer-ish at some point.
I switched to Maximize Velocity over Gravitic Punch as the mise them out card. I tended to want Gravitic Punch for the haste effect more than the double strike effect most of the time, and the CMC saving is huge.
The burn suite is moved up the scale mostly because of Wildgrowth Walker. Can't let that guy get out of hand. Shock has its share of targets but it's not fantastic at the moment in my experience. I'm also not trying to turbo out the Phoenix much any more.
As time goes by I have been playing this more and more like a control deck if the opponent is trying to attack with creatures at all (e.g. Golgari, Boros angels, anybody not playing counterspells). Ideally you spend turns 1-3 shaping your draw and clearing the board of their creatures. On turn 4 you play a drake, and on turn 5 you play an electromancer and three spells. If the opponent doesn't look to have quick removal you can try and live the dream by dropping the electromancer turn 2, but otherwise the deck's not built to get the Phoenix out until turn 4 or realistically turn 5.
The sideboard is a work in progress. I haven't played it with the Enigma Drake package yet. The idea is that you can go up with some portion of the big package (Ionize/Ral/Niv-Mizzet) or go down with some portion of the aggro package (Enigma Drake/Maximize Velocity/Dive Down).
I have found that Ral is great against all but the most aggressive of decks. Niv-Mizzet is great against everybody but Golgari. If we get to untap with him we pretty much win on the spot.
Fight with Fire is in the side for the matchups where you are stone cold certain you will be facing 5 toughness creatures that need to die, especially Niv-Mizzet. This deck will usually get up to five in the yard for beacon bolt, but usually isn't always. Staring at a Niv-Mizzet on the board and your Beacon Bolt in hand with only three or four instants in the yard feels pretty bad. In a longer game this deck can also kick it more often than you'd think.
Maybe it is because i play more cheap cantrips but by turn 6 i'll have way more than 5 spells in the bin for a niv-mizzet, but let's just look at some common situation you can face in standard : opponent at 20 drops a doom whisperer, do you want beacon bolt or fight with fire ? Opponent has a shalai and a lyra on the board, do you want fight with fire or beacon bolt ? you're low life facing a next turn lethal history of benala, do you want beacon bolt or fight with fire ? Opponent duresses you before playing its huge creature, do you want fight with fire or beacon bolt ? opponent plays a ghalta or a ferox, do you want a beacon bolt or a fight with fire ? You need to cast 3 spells ? Becon bolt is 2 spells, you need to discard a card ? Becon bolt is good to go from your graveyard. To be honest, if i have access to 9 mana i will draw my entire deck, kill your 2 best creatures with beacon bolt and kill you with phoenixes and negates, the kicker part is irrelevant.
For Niv-Mizzet he is great as long as your opponent can't discard it to get it back with elder reborn. If my opponent can't have this line of play in his control deck, i'll bring him in. Jeskai in particular can't do anything against a niv mizzet.
If you've looked at GP games, you'll notice that golgari's response to Izzet Drake is to go carnage tyrant ASAP and backing it with duress, if game stalls their only wincon is Finality on Tyrant. This game plan can be responded by either adding black to the mana base in order to play the second part of Discovery/Dispersal or by playing River's Rebuke as well as some mission briefing in order to have a huge reset button. Silent gravestone responds Deathgorge Scavenger if you're concerned about that card.
About shock vs lightning strike, i'm ok in having a more vulnerable main deck to wildgrowth walker or early aggro because i am confident i will win against all midrange and control decks in a best of 3 match but i can't count how many times i have shocked my own phoenixes to save them from exile so i want shock anytime in my main over lightning strike or lava coil. I like having a more all in G1 pack but very flexible sideboard options to be able to go either the control way with more burn or stay focus on the main game plan but adding powerful silver bullets (Niv-Mizzet and River's Rebuke) to turn games around. But i can't see a world where i don't play 3 negates in my sideboard it is the best sideboard card in the format by far.
Still not a fan of Ral is this deck to play more than one. I never want to have 2 of them stuck in my hand
"To keep things 100, anything I state is an opinion and not intended to be a fact. Any and all suggestions I give are a 100% opinion. If you need further clarification take the conversation to a PM. I am not in the business of assuming things. I'm only interested in 1 business and that business serves 2 things, Cold L's and Hot Dub's."
Against what decks are people actually bringing in Ral, Izzet Viceroy? It only really feels decent against Jeskai Control, and only then if they are siding out most of their counterspells.
I play one Ral as my 4th beacon bolt so i bring him in when i bring the removal package (i don't play MD lava coil), i also bring him in if my opponent is playing niv-mizzet or unmoored ego. So i side him in quite a lot, he's not game breaking in itself but fits well in your sideboard gameplan. I don't want to play 2 of them because 80% of the time you have better things to do than playing Ral so i never want to have 2 of them in my hand.
Also you should play 4 Discovery/dispersal, it is by far the best cantrip you can play in this deck.
I don't think it is, it is definitvely not a MD card because it is not an instant or sorcery and this deck uses all its mana every turn until very late in the game so i find it way too much mana intensive, vulnerable to too many things and an awful top deck even when you could fuel it fast.
The control match-up is already heavily in your favor if you're not playing an enigma drake/maximize velocity version and mostly resolves around hitting your land drop until you can play niv-mizzet+protection as they waste their counters/removals on your cantrips and hardcast phoenixes.
I'm happy this deck is finding success, had figured it would be a fun flash-in-the-pan type deck that I would eventually change to Jeskai Control; now I'm probably sticking with it at least until RNA. Been grinding mostly on Arena and Standard Showdown events, so I gear it towards Mono-Red, Golgari, and U/x Control decks.
"Izzet Midrange" is how I play the deck. I've found it difficult to contain Mono-Red without playing enough removal, so I don't like the Enigma Drake, Maximize Velocity, and Dive Down game plans. Also, a lot of the deck is wheel-spinning with cantrips, so I like resilient threats that play into that plan, ergo maxing out on Crackling Drakes and Electromancers, with Murmuring Mystic as my backup threat. I've ground out Boros Angels with Mystic before.
This MB version is very weak to Jeskai Control now that they've transitioned to Seal Away and Settle the Wreckage, but I don't think any Phoenix version is favored into newer Jeskai Control these days.
My answer to Jeskai is Firemind's Research, as it plays well with all the cantrips MB. It's fast enough to duck countermagic on the play and turn 2 tap land on the draw. I can play Negate and Stroke to beat Settle if I get the Phoenix god-draws, or fall back to countering Teferi if I'm grinding with Firemind's Research. The Chemister's Insights keep the spell count high enough as I side out all the red removal besides 2 of the Beacon Bolt/Fight with Fire/Lava Coil (depends on Jeskai's post-board creature plan). I hate tapping out past turn 4 unless it's for Niv-Mizzet with counter backup; Teferi is too crippling to not contest.
Of course, this is just my way of playing Izzet + Arclight Phoenix. There are a lot of viable builds out there, this is just what I've found most success on.
EDIT: Slight update to decklist; -1 Shock +1 Beacon Bolt MB; -1 Beacon Bolt +1 Fiery Cannonade SB.
I've been having great success with the archetype, but recently the number of g/b decks in my local meta has been on the rise and the deck just simply folds to a carnage tyrant (main board) if you can't throw a creature on its path, often time people would say just block it with a big drake, but somwtumes they get to ramp fast enough and with all the removal g/b has it's really gett8ng annoying
So that brings me to the question, aside from detection tower, how do you deal with carnage tyrant?
The best way to deal with carnage tyrant is to kill its owner. Trying to sit back and block BG is a dangerous game with all the removal they're running.
This is probably another argument in favor of the Enigma Drake build. Turn 4 drake + maximize velocity into turn 5 phoenix assault puts lot of pressure on them.
I've found recently that people online are a lot more ready for this deck. I've switched back over to mono blue for my daily grind, although I do still like this deck a lot.
Actually GB is the reason why i first tried playing withtout enigma drake and velocity, this game plan is very soft to GB deck, if you plan on landing a drake on turn 3 then a drake on turn 4 you play their game, they can go llanowar into explore creature into chupacabra into vivien which is a regular curve for them and they will beat you because you will be too far behind on board. Playing less drakes improves your GB match-up by a lot because you need less protection and you will play more instants and sorcery so you will see your phoenixes faster and more often.
Speaking about the giant hexproof monster, there's many many way to beat it, first and obvious one is be faster than carnage tyrant and you definitevely can, second one is trade for it this game plan is soft to finality and you have to take that into consideration, third one is play river rebuke, fourth one is play bad cards (detection tower).
Yes people are starting to adjust to the Izzet menace, the deck was the 2nd most popular deck on last GPs and had the best day2 conversion rate despite playing bad lists (enigma/velocity, most lists without discovery/dispersal, playing tormenting voices...) but to do that they need to weaken their game plan against something else, if GB wants to improve its match-up against phoenix it has to play a bunch of crap cards for aggro match-up (MD carnage tyrant+mana elves as seen in Javier Dominguez deck from GP Lille and get away from the explore package MD). Let's see how the meta evolves after the Pro-Tour but i predict there won't be many teferi played at this pro-tour and that Izzet Phoenix will be the most played deck or a close second to GB and that the most succesful version will not play enigma drake at all.
I had the phoenixes lying around from the get go so i decided to sleeve a typical list and try out what the fuzz is about.
Played against a friend on grixis control (sarkan wincon) and i must say. There was nothing much i could do to beat him apart from stalling.
Never had those very busted starts where multiple phoenixes etb on a given turn.
Goblin Electromancer felt really really bad versus a removal heavy deck like that and it made me doubt it's inclusion.
On the other end of the spectrum, Niv Mizzet from the board was awesome.
It also helped restocking the hand as i felt the deck ran out of gas after the first time you trigger the phoenixes from the board.
For now, i'm thinking of moving both Mizzets to the main, drop the playset of electromancer and add two more lands (23 total).
Your views are match-up oriented, yes grixis dragons is one of Izzet worst match up because of vraska's contempt+yawgmoth vile offering, facing a turn 3 sharkan into a turn 4 Niv-Mizzet is almost unbeatable for the deck, yes electromancer isn't that good in that match up because of ritual of soot or golden demise (i cut one of them after sideboard against this deck). Electromancer is what allows this deck to exist but you have to be smart on how you play them, against removals heavy decks you want to be able to chain at least one discounted spell right of the bat when you play it, this means don't play it on turn 2 unless you have another one in hand.
Niv-Mizzet is an absolute beast in this match-up but you can't play it MD in a world of chupacabra and vivien, heck i even avoid to side him in if my opponent can discard it and get it back via elder reborn.
I think if you want to play MD niv-mizzet you have to play sharkan and then you can't really play phoenix anymore because you'll be playing too many non instant and sorcery cards and you'll end up in a very different deck maybe way more control burn oriented.
Then again this deck is not easy to play, a lot of choises are counter intuitive (why should i not attack with my haste creature or my 8/4 flying ?) but it is by far the most busted thing you can do in standard since Aetherworks Marvel into Ulamog.
Murmuring Mystic is a house vs. GB Midrange if it survives an untap step. It's either faster or cannot be answered at all by their planeswalkers and survives Finality, so you can bait out their Chupacabra, ATrophy, or Contempt with other threats, then unload with Mystic. I beat GB 2-0 at last night's FNM on the back of Mystics, specifically outracing Carnage Tyrant game 1.
This deck's weakness is that it plays 16 cantrip effects, so it has to give up some threats and answers mainboard to facilitate its game plan. That's why it's soft to a pure control deck MB, because it doesn't have a critical mass of threats while being burdened with red removal spells that are necessary for the rest of the format. You correct this by diversifying the SB threats with Niv-Mizzet and Firemind's Research, then play enough counterspells to answer Control's best threat (usually Teferi) or create a critical turn with Niv-Mizzet to overwhelm them.
That would suggest that the deck is fine for lands, since I just estimated 18+(16/2) = 26 land equivalents. You also need to get lands in your opener, and you need to hit two land drops before you can even start casting Radical Idea and Chart a Course. But Frank Karsten estimated that 18 lands gives you 97% probability of finding your first two land drops (with proper mulligan strategy and scry). Having 8 1-mana cantrips helps even more. Hitting the 3rd at 90% or more needs 22 lands (or 25 on the play) according to his calculations, but you should have all the cantrips online by turn two.
So the question may be, are you OK with spending the first 2 turns digging for lands with cantrips? I suspect yes, since those cantrips feed the Drakes. How's it working in testing?
https://www.channelfireball.com/articles/how-many-lands-do-you-need-to-consistently-hit-your-land-drops/
I've been happy with 21. It's possible to feel flooded but with all the hand shaping going on it's usually not too bad.
Also, some evidence for the explosiveness of this deck. This is the board state during my opponent's turn the turn before they conceded:
That's a 9/7 Lyra and a 4/7 Aurelia standing in front of an Ajani that's close to ultimate. Opponent attacked with Lyra and I chumped to make the life score 20-29. Then I drew Discovery and used it to find Beacon Bolt. Beacon Bolt took down both angels and put my Phoenix in the yard, both Phoenixes came back and together with the Electromancer took down Ajani.
Not surprised to see the deck showing good results the deck is really strong even if the versions that showed at the GPs are the bad ones (enigma drake+velocity is cute but it makes your whole deck weaker, playing more cheap cantrips and less lands is better).
This is my current decklist, might try murmuring mystic for the mirror as long as people can't give trample+first strike to their drakes. And about the lands debate, i sometimes cut a land after sideboard when i cut the drakes but the deck can and will usually use any mana avaible at every turn of the game so hitting land drop every turn is good. Sure you will sometimes draw too many lands but beeing stuck on 3 lands on turn 3 and 4 is not what you wanna do, you'll need 6 mana on turn 6 if you have no electromancer to play radical idea and chart a course, for 5 mana you can go electromancer and 3 two mana spells so you want lands the whole game.
3 Crackling Drake
4 Goblin Electromancer
3 Warlord's Fury
3 Crash Through
3 Shock
4 Opt
4 Radical Idea
4 Chart a Course
4 Discovery // Dispersal
2 Beacon Bolt
2 Chemister's Insight
6 Mountain
4 Sulfur Falls
4 Steam Vents
3 Negate
2 Disdainful Stroke
1 Beacon Bolt
2 Niv-Mizzet, Parun
3 Lava Coil
2 River's Rebuke
1 Ral, Izzet Viceroy
1 Crackling Drake
Fight with Fire is in the side for the matchups where you are stone cold certain you will be facing 5 toughness creatures that need to die, especially Niv-Mizzet. This deck will usually get up to five in the yard for beacon bolt, but usually isn't always. Staring at a Niv-Mizzet on the board and your Beacon Bolt in hand with only three or four instants in the yard feels pretty bad. In a longer game this deck can also kick it more often than you'd think.
I agree that Firemind's Research is suspect. It's horrible off the top. Even if you land it on turn two I'd say it's good, not great. If you want that effect I'd just play Search for Azcanta.
Mission Briefing is definitely worth a look. I find the deck works better when you don't sell out to try to live the turn three dream anyway. I'm already trying to get as much blue mana out there as possible.
Drakes also showed up as a decent portion of the GP metagame and had top 8 appearances in both Lille and New Jersey. Both of the top 8 decks featured Enigma Drake over Discovery. Might be an indicator of where the deck is going.
Since it looks like the deck has some legs I'll work on editing the original post to be more primer-ish at some point.
Here is where I am right now:
5 Mountain
1 Izzet Guildgate
4 Sulfur Falls
4 Steam Vents
4 Opt
2 Shock
1 Lightning Strike
4 Lava Coil
2 Beacon Bolt
4 Chart a Course
4 Radical Idea
4 Discovery // Dispersal
1 Chemister's Insight
4 Crackling Drake
4 Arclight Phoenix
4 Goblin Electromancer
1 Maximize Velocity
2 Dive Down
3 Enigma Drake
2 Fiery Cannonade
1 Fight with Fire
2 Ionize
2 Ral, Izzet Viceroy
2 Niv-Mizzet, Parun
I switched to Maximize Velocity over Gravitic Punch as the mise them out card. I tended to want Gravitic Punch for the haste effect more than the double strike effect most of the time, and the CMC saving is huge.
The burn suite is moved up the scale mostly because of Wildgrowth Walker. Can't let that guy get out of hand. Shock has its share of targets but it's not fantastic at the moment in my experience. I'm also not trying to turbo out the Phoenix much any more.
As time goes by I have been playing this more and more like a control deck if the opponent is trying to attack with creatures at all (e.g. Golgari, Boros angels, anybody not playing counterspells). Ideally you spend turns 1-3 shaping your draw and clearing the board of their creatures. On turn 4 you play a drake, and on turn 5 you play an electromancer and three spells. If the opponent doesn't look to have quick removal you can try and live the dream by dropping the electromancer turn 2, but otherwise the deck's not built to get the Phoenix out until turn 4 or realistically turn 5.
The sideboard is a work in progress. I haven't played it with the Enigma Drake package yet. The idea is that you can go up with some portion of the big package (Ionize/Ral/Niv-Mizzet) or go down with some portion of the aggro package (Enigma Drake/Maximize Velocity/Dive Down).
I have found that Ral is great against all but the most aggressive of decks. Niv-Mizzet is great against everybody but Golgari. If we get to untap with him we pretty much win on the spot.
Maybe it is because i play more cheap cantrips but by turn 6 i'll have way more than 5 spells in the bin for a niv-mizzet, but let's just look at some common situation you can face in standard : opponent at 20 drops a doom whisperer, do you want beacon bolt or fight with fire ? Opponent has a shalai and a lyra on the board, do you want fight with fire or beacon bolt ? you're low life facing a next turn lethal history of benala, do you want beacon bolt or fight with fire ? Opponent duresses you before playing its huge creature, do you want fight with fire or beacon bolt ? opponent plays a ghalta or a ferox, do you want a beacon bolt or a fight with fire ? You need to cast 3 spells ? Becon bolt is 2 spells, you need to discard a card ? Becon bolt is good to go from your graveyard. To be honest, if i have access to 9 mana i will draw my entire deck, kill your 2 best creatures with beacon bolt and kill you with phoenixes and negates, the kicker part is irrelevant.
For Niv-Mizzet he is great as long as your opponent can't discard it to get it back with elder reborn. If my opponent can't have this line of play in his control deck, i'll bring him in. Jeskai in particular can't do anything against a niv mizzet.
If you've looked at GP games, you'll notice that golgari's response to Izzet Drake is to go carnage tyrant ASAP and backing it with duress, if game stalls their only wincon is Finality on Tyrant. This game plan can be responded by either adding black to the mana base in order to play the second part of Discovery/Dispersal or by playing River's Rebuke as well as some mission briefing in order to have a huge reset button. Silent gravestone responds Deathgorge Scavenger if you're concerned about that card.
About shock vs lightning strike, i'm ok in having a more vulnerable main deck to wildgrowth walker or early aggro because i am confident i will win against all midrange and control decks in a best of 3 match but i can't count how many times i have shocked my own phoenixes to save them from exile so i want shock anytime in my main over lightning strike or lava coil. I like having a more all in G1 pack but very flexible sideboard options to be able to go either the control way with more burn or stay focus on the main game plan but adding powerful silver bullets (Niv-Mizzet and River's Rebuke) to turn games around. But i can't see a world where i don't play 3 negates in my sideboard it is the best sideboard card in the format by far.
Still not a fan of Ral is this deck to play more than one. I never want to have 2 of them stuck in my hand
-Stay Frosty
I play one Ral as my 4th beacon bolt so i bring him in when i bring the removal package (i don't play MD lava coil), i also bring him in if my opponent is playing niv-mizzet or unmoored ego. So i side him in quite a lot, he's not game breaking in itself but fits well in your sideboard gameplan. I don't want to play 2 of them because 80% of the time you have better things to do than playing Ral so i never want to have 2 of them in my hand.
Also you should play 4 Discovery/dispersal, it is by far the best cantrip you can play in this deck.
I don't think it is, it is definitvely not a MD card because it is not an instant or sorcery and this deck uses all its mana every turn until very late in the game so i find it way too much mana intensive, vulnerable to too many things and an awful top deck even when you could fuel it fast.
The control match-up is already heavily in your favor if you're not playing an enigma drake/maximize velocity version and mostly resolves around hitting your land drop until you can play niv-mizzet+protection as they waste their counters/removals on your cantrips and hardcast phoenixes.
5 Mountain
1 Izzet Guildgate
4 Steam Vents
4 Sulfur Falls
4 Goblin Electromancer
2 Murmuring Mystic
4 Arclight Phoenix
4 Crackling Drake
4 Chart a Course
4 Radical Idea
3 Shock
4 Lava Coil
2 Beacon Bolt
4 Discovery // Dispersal
2 Niv-Mizzet, Parun
2 Disdainful Stroke
2 Negate
2 Chemister's Insight
3 Fiery Cannonade
1 Fight with Fire
3 Firemind's Research
"Izzet Midrange" is how I play the deck. I've found it difficult to contain Mono-Red without playing enough removal, so I don't like the Enigma Drake, Maximize Velocity, and Dive Down game plans. Also, a lot of the deck is wheel-spinning with cantrips, so I like resilient threats that play into that plan, ergo maxing out on Crackling Drakes and Electromancers, with Murmuring Mystic as my backup threat. I've ground out Boros Angels with Mystic before.
This MB version is very weak to Jeskai Control now that they've transitioned to Seal Away and Settle the Wreckage, but I don't think any Phoenix version is favored into newer Jeskai Control these days.
My answer to Jeskai is Firemind's Research, as it plays well with all the cantrips MB. It's fast enough to duck countermagic on the play and turn 2 tap land on the draw. I can play Negate and Stroke to beat Settle if I get the Phoenix god-draws, or fall back to countering Teferi if I'm grinding with Firemind's Research. The Chemister's Insights keep the spell count high enough as I side out all the red removal besides 2 of the Beacon Bolt/Fight with Fire/Lava Coil (depends on Jeskai's post-board creature plan). I hate tapping out past turn 4 unless it's for Niv-Mizzet with counter backup; Teferi is too crippling to not contest.
Of course, this is just my way of playing Izzet + Arclight Phoenix. There are a lot of viable builds out there, this is just what I've found most success on.
EDIT: Slight update to decklist; -1 Shock +1 Beacon Bolt MB; -1 Beacon Bolt +1 Fiery Cannonade SB.
So that brings me to the question, aside from detection tower, how do you deal with carnage tyrant?
This is probably another argument in favor of the Enigma Drake build. Turn 4 drake + maximize velocity into turn 5 phoenix assault puts lot of pressure on them.
I've found recently that people online are a lot more ready for this deck. I've switched back over to mono blue for my daily grind, although I do still like this deck a lot.
Speaking about the giant hexproof monster, there's many many way to beat it, first and obvious one is be faster than carnage tyrant and you definitevely can, second one is trade for it this game plan is soft to finality and you have to take that into consideration, third one is play river rebuke, fourth one is play bad cards (detection tower).
Yes people are starting to adjust to the Izzet menace, the deck was the 2nd most popular deck on last GPs and had the best day2 conversion rate despite playing bad lists (enigma/velocity, most lists without discovery/dispersal, playing tormenting voices...) but to do that they need to weaken their game plan against something else, if GB wants to improve its match-up against phoenix it has to play a bunch of crap cards for aggro match-up (MD carnage tyrant+mana elves as seen in Javier Dominguez deck from GP Lille and get away from the explore package MD). Let's see how the meta evolves after the Pro-Tour but i predict there won't be many teferi played at this pro-tour and that Izzet Phoenix will be the most played deck or a close second to GB and that the most succesful version will not play enigma drake at all.
Played against a friend on grixis control (sarkan wincon) and i must say. There was nothing much i could do to beat him apart from stalling.
Never had those very busted starts where multiple phoenixes etb on a given turn.
Goblin Electromancer felt really really bad versus a removal heavy deck like that and it made me doubt it's inclusion.
On the other end of the spectrum, Niv Mizzet from the board was awesome.
It also helped restocking the hand as i felt the deck ran out of gas after the first time you trigger the phoenixes from the board.
For now, i'm thinking of moving both Mizzets to the main, drop the playset of electromancer and add two more lands (23 total).
What are your thoughts about this?
Modern: WUBRG Humans - GBW Traverse - GWU Knightfall - GRW Bushwhacker Zoo -
Niv-Mizzet is an absolute beast in this match-up but you can't play it MD in a world of chupacabra and vivien, heck i even avoid to side him in if my opponent can discard it and get it back via elder reborn.
I think if you want to play MD niv-mizzet you have to play sharkan and then you can't really play phoenix anymore because you'll be playing too many non instant and sorcery cards and you'll end up in a very different deck maybe way more control burn oriented.
Then again this deck is not easy to play, a lot of choises are counter intuitive (why should i not attack with my haste creature or my 8/4 flying ?) but it is by far the most busted thing you can do in standard since Aetherworks Marvel into Ulamog.
This deck's weakness is that it plays 16 cantrip effects, so it has to give up some threats and answers mainboard to facilitate its game plan. That's why it's soft to a pure control deck MB, because it doesn't have a critical mass of threats while being burdened with red removal spells that are necessary for the rest of the format. You correct this by diversifying the SB threats with Niv-Mizzet and Firemind's Research, then play enough counterspells to answer Control's best threat (usually Teferi) or create a critical turn with Niv-Mizzet to overwhelm them.