MTG Salvation

As everyone knows, Arclight Phoenix is an extremely strong card, but it's fallen out of use.

I saw a thread on Standard Dredge, and I thought maybe mixing the 2 together might yield something.

In particular, Stitcher's Supplier seems like the ideal enabler for Phoenix. Another strong enabler and card advantage is Jadelight Ranger

The third piece of the puzzle is the manabase, and I'm playing a 5-color Gates deck, so I thought I could use that. The alternative is going Grixis.

So, I built an unholy monstrosity on Magic Arena, and it's performing surprisingly well, although I've been losing to Esper (which I didn't expect), Vraska's Contempts seem to work well against the version which I built that has no early pressure.

Creeping Chill and Plaza of Harmony make racing a good possibility against aggro (I beat 3 monored decks out of 4 I played). I died to a Ghalta (no way to kill it) and to several Esper decks.

The core of the deck is:


For the rest, I'm considering two options:

5-color Gates - I was playing a Gates shell with Gatebreaker Ram and Gates Ablaze (I thought Ram + Maximize Velocity was cute, but maybe it's TOO cute). Manabase included Gateway Plaza and Plaza of Harmony for the sweet 5 color fixing, plus Izzet Gates and the rest (focusing on blue, red, black and green in that order). This version played Jadelight Ranger and Glowspore Shaman.

A Grixis shell: this might be better (Gates has too many taplands), and Crackling Drake is a flying Ram that replaces itself.

There are Izzet and Rakdos versions (https://article.hareruyamtg.com/article/22668/?lang=en), so Grixis should be the best of both worlds, losing Gates Ablaze but Fiery Cannonade or single removal (Beacon Bolt and Lava Coil) could take its place.

A card I'm strongly considering is Thought Erasure to improve the Esper matchup. I probably should add some number of Dive Downs too. A third idea was Search for Azcanta but it's probably too slow.

Pteramander might also play well with the Suppliers, although too many creatures dilute the spell pool.

Niv-Mizzet might be an answer to Monoblue and Esper, although I didn't see any monoblue yet at Diamond. Maybe a Krasis or two too

Any thoughts? Think this might fly or is this madness? small sample size says it's viable but untuned.

I am very interested in this deck a lot! Do you have a full decklist you have been playing with?

This is my latest Arena decklist:


There's a bunch of cards I want to try.
Took out Niv-Mizzet as he's way too slow.
I currently have a 4-4 record (50%) with that list.
Lost to:
- Mardu Judith (Gutterbones, Adanto Vanguard(!!!), Judith, Heroic Reinforcements), Judith did me in even with a boardclear
- Monored (the "god hand", I didn't even get to untap on my 4th turn)
- Abzan Superfriends (!!!) which landed a turn 3 Kaya on the play (oof)
- Selesnya, I didn't draw Gates Ablaze

Won against:
- Grixis Control (a really close game)
- Monored twice
- Esper which conceded (not a "real" win, probably person needed to drop)

Latest additions are the 1x Banefire (for a Negate) and 1x Ritual of Soot (after losing to Selesnya for not drawing a boardclear).

This looks pretty sweet! I am definitely going to try running this on arena, thank you for posting this! I will definitely tell you if I notice anything while playing

Awesome . I'm 4-1 today, but still tweaking, unsure on Ritual of Soot vs Cry of the Carnarium (which is a "nonbo" with Phoenixes).

Creeping Chills are surprisingly good even when hardcast vs aggro.

I've won a bunch of very close games, which I guess it's the main way the Phoenix decks win, including vs Jeskai Control which played 3x Niv-Mizzet.

I added an extra Beacon Bolt and cut a Negate, but I really want 2x Negates, don't know where to fit the 2nd.

If you want a Cry of the Carnarium effect, you could try golden demise worst case it sends your birds to the yard too, best case it leaves your side uneffected

Golden Demise is a good idea. I´m very unsure on the 5th board sweeper - I currently cut it.

Did you end up trying the deck? I´ve had very little time so far, played about 10 more games.

I´ve made some further changes. Mission Briefing has been a card that´s been REALLY impressive, so I´m testing 3 right now.

I´m unsatisfied with the deck´s top end. On one hand, the deck feels very powerful, on the other I feel like I´m walking a tightrope, I´ve lost several games where I identified one slight misplay that lost me the game. I´m also not abusing Gates (only Plaza and Ablaze as payoffs), that might be a mistake (maybe change a Chemister´s Insight for a Guild Summit, also, overdrawing shouldn´t be an issue.

Thinking of crafting the Immortal Sun for Ral too, does all I want (stops walkers, almost unkillable for Esper if they can´t counter it, draws cards, reduces costs and buffs Phoenixes), but it´s not a wincon unlike Ral.

Tested Doom Whisperer, he sounds really good in theory but I´m still not sold. Bone Dragon would be nice but it´s another Mythic Wildcard for a card that rotates soon.

I did play around with it, I kept having land issues, I might not be mulliganing aggressively enough. I also am thinking about cutting the 5th sweeper, it is probably just my bad luck but I keep getting matched against Esper and the board wipes keep clogging up my hand. I like the idea of the immortal sun but I think I like the idea of the idea of Doom Whisperer or Bone Dragon more but seeing as I already have the whisperer I think will test him first. Guild summit seems like a nice gate abuse and might be good in place of an insight. I really like Ral though I also run him in my izzet phoenix deck so I might be biased. He just runs away with the game once resolved.

Thanks! Looking forward to your feedback and your decklist I made some changes to the manabase, I cut 2 Gateway Plazas because they're too clunky, went up to 4 Dimir Guildgates, and added a Swamp (might change that to an Island, as it´s very blue-intensive).

I´m playing on Best of 1 Arena which has the mana-smoothing algorithm, in "real life" or Best of 3, I´d go up to 20 land probably. I´ve mulliganned to 6 a few times (usually Creeping Chills or no land), the London Mulligan would be great for this.

I´ve been doing Mission Briefing into Opt a lot , that plus a spell returns Phoenixes .

I cut the Drakes for my experiments (Doom Whisperer et al).

Edit: I added 2x Thought Erasure more and the 2nd Negate and improved my Esper matchup a lot. Mission Briefing + Banefire is also very nice.

Nice, those changes sound really good to me, I will try to get my deklist up tonight but might be a bit because I want to test some stuff first and I am playing best of 1 too, I guess I am just super unlucky lol

Still very little time to play. Went up to 20 land and seems to be the "magic" number (I started having to mulligan more than I liked on 19).

Continue to hover around 50% winrate (about 10 wins and 10 losses), so no "breakthrough". Lost to some weird mainboard cards, including twice to Ethereal Absolution (which is a graveyard hoser too). So I added Blink of an Eye but I realized now that Discovery // Dispersal could be an option to remove troublesome permanents too.

I got a bit pissed at always drawing the Creeping Chills, so I dropped some. I shaved some numbers (an Opt and a Stitcher) to fit other cards to test, I´d like to go back to 4-ofs but I need data on the cards I´m testing.



I added Cry of the Carnarium after I lost to a White Weenie with Hunted Witnesses and a Golgari deck with Midnight Reaper but might have been an overreaction (it did exile my Stitcher's Suppliers which is a nonbo).

Thought Erasures continue to perform very well, and Mission Briefing is still amazing (extra Gates Ablaze or Thought Erasure or Negate or Banefire, or Opt for returning Phoenix). I don´t miss Ral Zarek.

I theorized that Crackling Drake + Maximize Velocity can be a good finisher vs Esper, hasn´t happened yet but the Drakes have performed well. I really want a solid plan vs Esper, I feel good in most other matchups.

Yes! I finally got a list that beats Esper more or less consistently

I caved in and crafted The Immortal Sun and it´s been all I´ve ever wanted (heck, some Esper decks conceded on the spot).

I also added one copy of Search for Azcanta and it´s also been clutch.