MTG Salvation

Standard Showdown tonight. Went 3-1 for 4th place finish.

Round 1: Dino Enrage. 2-0. This was against the store owner and he was testing out a janky Naya Walking Ballista Dinos deck. We didn't SB against each other. First game I got off to a strange start with 3 Gifted Aetherborn and a Siren Stormtamer by turn 4. He assembled a weird combo of that Dino with enrage that makes 3/3s, a Walking Ballista with 3 counters and a spell that makes a creature indestructible until end of turn. He made 3 3/3s with Ballista. Next turn I Baral's Expertise'd and Aetherborns got me there. Second game was pretty similar, a couple Aetherborn kept the board under control until I landed Scarab God for game.

Round 2: Ramunap Red. 2-0. This was against my GF and after a lot more testing from the last time I posted, the matchup is closer to 50/50 so I was a bit worried going in. I lost the die roll but ended up drawing the perfect hand to go against hers the first game, pushing a Bomat and Dispersal on T4 Hazoret. Kitesail ripped her only removal and Hostage Taker grabbed a Crasher and I got through with an Aetherborn a lot. Sided out 1 Baral's Expertise, 1 Hostage Taker, 1 Walk the Plank, 1 Champion of Wits, and 1 Siren Stormtamer, sided in 3 Essence Extraction, 2 Doomfall. Game 2 I had a hand of Fatal Push, Aetherborn, Essence Extraction, Freebooter, Scarab God, Catacomb, Swamp. I ripped enough lands to drop Scarab God turn 5 and she had no way of getting rid of it.

Round 3: Sultai Energy 0-2. I kept a 5 land hand with Champion of Wits and Fatal Push. Thought it was keepable with the Champion of Wits, which was probably fine. But I proceeded to just draw land every turn and then Champion of Wits found 2 lands. I played 2 spells that game. Oh well. Game 2 was probably one of the most entertaining matches ever. I sided out 3 Kitesail Freebooter, 1 Champion of Wits, 1 Baral's Expertise, sided in 2 Bontu's, 1 Harsh Scrutiny, 2 Doomfall. I got a great start and Harsh Scrutiny took out a Bristling Hydra, Push got Cub, Doomfall grabbed a Ballista from his hand. He dropped T6 Carnage Tyrant out of left field and I played Bontu's leaving us both basically empty handed. The rest of the match was so grindy and hilarious. Every time one of us would get the upper hand, the other would draw the exact answer needed. At one point he played a Glint-Sieve Siphoner and then Vizier of Many Faces copying it. I pushed the copy at end of his turn and then Hostage Taker took the original on my turn and I played it. Drew a card off of it eventually and he pushed it. I had him at 2 and I was at 14 at one point. He was able to stabilize and gain life with Deathgorge Scavenger and I Deadlands'd it. He eventually topdecked a huuuuge Walking Ballista and killed me with it. At the end of the match I had 15 cards left in my library and I had not seen Scarab God ONCE. All I had to do was draw it to win, but nope. I can't even be mad though, that match was amazing and it took so long everyone had gathered around to watch the shenanigans.

Round 4: Temur Energy. 2-0. Good ol' Temur *groans*. First game I controlled the early game and just out midranged him until I could drop Scarab God with protection. That was literally it, he couldn't beat a resolved Scarab God with Stormtamer on the field. I was fairly certain he was going to side into more control, so I sided out 1 Field of Ruin, 1 Baral's Expertise, 2 Champion of Wits, 2 Hostage Taker, 2 Lookout's Disperal (I run 1 Essence Scatter main) and sided in 2 Bontu's, 1 Harsh Scrutiny, 2 Negate, 1 Duress, 2 Doomfall.

Second game was some good ol' midrange strats. Duress and Freebooter took out Essence Scatter and Harnessed Lightning letting me land T5 Scarab God. He didn't rip an answer, but he did land 3 Whirlers and a Bristling Hydra up to this point so it wasn't over immediately. After my Scarab God, though, he unnecessarily played out the rest of his hand onto the field and I got a nice 6-for-1 with Bontu's. He wasn't expecting a sweeper. Replayed Scarab God and it carried me. He managed to find a Confiscation Coup, but I had enough mana to reanimate and sacrifice a Stormtamer and he scooped showing me the Negate backup in his hand. Lol.

Lots of good games tonight and I'm pretty happy overall. Some matchups are a coinflip like Ramunap, but against other midrange strategies and slower aggro we seem to be favored. I really feel I should've won the Sultai match, but flooding the first game and never finding Scarab God the second game was pretty brutal.

Closing notes: Bontu's is great against Energy decks, it might be worth fitting a 3rd in the SB. 3 of the 5 Energy decks tonight were running Carnage Tyrants in the SB as tech against Temur and control so look out for that. Essence Scatter was extremely strong in the MB. Some matches are really grindy and a 4 mana tax becomes negligible at a certain point. I think I'm going to try 1 more Essence Scatter over a Lookout's Dispersal for a total of 2 Scatters/3 Dispersal.

Have you thought about running 4 Renegade Map and cutting down on lands? Gives another Turn 1 play, fixes, it's an improvise rock, and it meshes with Marionette Master.

This is the version I built before finding this thread and it's been testing pretty well against Ramunap. It goes deeper down the treasure route with Inspiring Statuary added in.



I'd love to fit in Yahenni's Expertise as it seems pretty strong here.

Well, got my first tournament win since I came back to Magic. 3-0 at a small 8 person Showdown. Played against UBR every round, oddly enough.

Game 1, UBR Superfriends?: I'm not entirely sure what they were playing, but a lot of planeswalkers were involved. Chandra, Ob Nixilis, and Liliana. Lost the first game to a to a resolved Chandra Ult and Ob Nixilis. I balanced between committing and attacking the planeswalkers and setting up the combo around counterspells in the second game and squeaked out the win. We were almost at time by this point and I was thinking we'd just draw, but that wasn't in the cards (lol). Major blowout game 3, I started with 2x island, map, engineer, statuary, 2x cheerios. I didn't think it was possible without whir, but turns out you can win on turn 4 if you have absolutely insane luck. Opponent was quite mad to lose to a "jank" deck

Game 2, UBR Aggro: Prized Amalgam combo can be really, really explosive sometimes and I loved the way my opponent's deck worked. Prized Amalgam, Stitchwing Skaab, Haunted Dead, Drake Haven, Tormenting Voice, Cathartic Reunion were the core. Went to 3 games and the last was very, very close and I had to attempt the combo into counter spell mana. They didn't have the counter, thankfully. Opponent was awesome and we were bull*****ting the entire time (He looked at me in disbelief when he read Reservoir and said "You're playing storm in standard? Seriously?" xD.) We talked about our decks at length after the matches were over. He laughed about the swamp.

Game 3, UBR Aggro: I knew I had this round in the bag before it started. My opponent was the owner of the store, playing so that an 8-man could fire, and he was playing a less tuned version of the deck I'd just played against. I knew this because my game 2 opponent had copied his deck and tuned it. Store owner didn't even have a sideboard nor abrade/counters MB. I have no idea how he ended up in the final round lol... Ended it 2-0, mulled to 6 first game and then combo'd off uneventfully. Mulled to 5 with zero lands the second game, but I had map, 2 cheerios, engineer, and outcome so I decided to keep, figuring it'd go to game 3 and I could be on the play. Went to turn 3 without lands, but my opponent got stuck on Aether Hub and mountain and couldn't cast anything important beyond a Drake Haven. Finally drew land on turn 4, my swamp lol. Game went very long as we finally started drawing lands. He got me down to 7 with lethal on the board and zero cards in either of our hands. I memory into outcome for 10, finally finding reservoir, and then expertise the combo for the win.

Feels good, man. My game 1 opponent still called it janky, but was happy that at least he lost to the tournament winner lol. Walked away with 2 Showdown packs and $9 in store credit. Opened up a neato foil Crane to put in the deck

The Pirate God

A Tempo/Midrange UB deck...

The deck first started as a Tempo deck (Blue Black Tempo Jacks), but after extensive testing, I realised how powerful The Scarab God really was. Playing the God instead of more Tempo oriented cards was already a step closer to Midrange. And after reading SaffronOlive's article, I realised Midrange really was the direction Pirates should be taken. Another PRIMER was required, even if the deck still has a certain Tempo feeling to it...

Disclaimer : I'll give full credit to SaffronOlive for the deck list. I tweaked the lands a bit, and one or two cards in the main deck, but that's all. Also, I want to point out that @jacobk was the first to my knowledge to post a deck list with full playset of Gifted Aetherborn and Champion of Wits.

CURRENT VERSION OF THE DECK

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WHY THE DECK IS SO GOOD?

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1. It features the most powerful card in Standard right now, The Scarab God. And unlike UB Control, it doesn't rely on opponent's cards for good targets to Eternalize (Siren Stormtamer, Kitesail Freebooter, Gifted Aetherborn and Hostage Taker).
2. It plays a lot of card advantage, and at every step of the curve, with Kitesail Freebooter, Champion of Wits, Hostage Taker and The Scarab God.
3. It has very good answers to any problems in metagame (Lookout's Dispersal, Fatal Push, Trial of Ambition, Walk the Plank, Essence Extraction and Vraska's Contempt).
4. It's manabase is reliable, and won't let you down.
5. It can play any role on the metagame clock, and doesn't have any bad matchups.

DETAILED EXPLANATIONS :

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1. The most powerful card in Standard right now is The Scarab God. And it will likely stay so until it rotates out in a year from now. And this deck probably offers one of the best assortment of targets for its ability :

• 4/4 Flash Hostage Taker is insane card advantage ;
• 4/4 Flash Flyers (Siren Stormtamer and Kitesail Freebooter) that can beat down, disrupt hand, protect us and our creatures ;
• 4/4 Flash Deathtouch Lifelink Gifted Aetherborn to ambush big creatures with hexproof.

2. Amazing card advantage all around the curve :

• Kitesail Freebooter is usually a 2-for-1, since it can protect itself (exile a removal) and Stormtamer or Dispersal can protect it even further ;
• Champion of Wits to loot away cards you don't need for that matchup, and/or discard targets for the God (and pure card advantage when you Eternalize it, so you don't mind if it dies to Walking Balista) ;
• Hostage Taker is a 3-for-1 most of the time, and we're better at protecting it than any other decks with Stormtamer, Freebooter and Dispersal ;
• The Scarab God itself is card advantage (unless countered or exiled right away). But eternalize Kitesail Freebooter or Hostage Taker and we get card advantage over card advantage.

3. Very good answers :

• Lookout's Dispersal is an excellent counterspell. It can deal with T4 bombs (Hazoret, Hydra, Chandra) even when we're on the draw and don't have any Pirates on the battlefield. I'll take four.
• Fatal Push, helped by Evolving Wilds, is super cheap and effective removal. I'll take four, too.
• Walk the Plank is cheap and good at the moment (no Merfolk in the meta right now), despite being a sorcery. One is enough.
• Trial of Ambition deals with Gods and hexproof creatures (Bristling Hydra and Carnage Tyrant). It's narrow, so make that one.
• Essence Extraction kills many creatures in the current meta. It's an instant and gains you some life. It's not cheap, and selectively effective, so only one in the main deck.
• Vraska's Contempt instantly kills everything, even Gods and Planeswalkers. Gaining 2 life is nice. But it costs 4, so make that two in the 75.

4. Reliable manabase :
"The best decks are usually the ones with the best mana" - Frank Karsten. Allied-Color decks don't have Fastlands, but we have a better mid-to-long game with Checklands (ETB untapped) and Cyclelands (flood protection). And staying in two colors adds to reliability.

5. It can play many roles :

• Aggro-Control to beat Control : With 23 creatures, hand disruptions and counterspells, it can play aggressively while protecting the board from sweepers. Champion of Wits will even make sure removals (dead cards) are filtered out to the graveyard.
• Control to beat Combo : Main deck counterspells and hand disruptions can deal with most combos, and removals can even take care of Electrostatic Pummeler.
• Combo to beat Midrange : Hostage Taker removes a threat and gives you control of it, while The Scarab God will quickly snowballs to victory.
• Midrange to beat Aggro : 9 removals and 4 Gifted Aetherborn take care of the early games problems, and 25%+ of the deck being card advantage will make sure opponent dries out before you do.

Only the mirror matchup is probably a coin toss. I otherwise beleive the deck to have a 55-65% MWP across the board.

SIDEBOARD PLAN :

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• VS CONTROL (UW Approach, UB Control) : Take out all removals (except Vraska's Contempt) and one Hostage Taker to add Duress, Negate, Jace, Cunning Castaway and Liliana, Death's Majesty.
• VS AGGRO (Ramunap Red, Energy decks) : Essence Extraction is key here, taking out 1 Liliana, Death's Majesty (too slow for this matchup), 1 Hostage Taker (she's worse with more removals) and 1 Kitesail Freebooter (with 12 burn spells, removal #2 will kill it fast).
• VS MIDRANGE (BUx Energy) : Bontu's Last Reckoning is a better sweeper than Yaheeni's Expertise vs fat creatures, and Doomfall can take care of The Scarab God and Glorybringer. Outs are : 1 Essence Extraction (not good enough), 1 Siren Stormtamer (not much removals on the other side), 2 Kitesail Freebooter (not many non-creature spells) and 1 Champion of Wits (because the curve).
• VS COMBO (Gift, Pummeler) : Duress, Negate and Doomfall are our best options here, while Fatal Push, Walk the Plank and Essence Extraction are not as good, as well as Liliana, Death's Majesty.

SPECIAL PLAYS :

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• Champion of Wits + Hostage Taker. Exile Champion with Taker if no good targets are available (or if you can't protect Taker and no better play on turn 4). If Taker dies, we get a free Champion. If not, we get to cast Champion again (and loot).
• Champion of Wits + Champion of Wits : Discard second Champion when you loot with the first, so you can Eternalize it later and get real card advantage.
• Field of Ruin + Fatal Push : The basic land fetched enters the battlefield untapped. Sacrificing Field of Ruin triggers Revolt, and the Swamp fetched can cast Fatal Push.

CARDS UNDER CONSIDERATION :

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• Gonti, Lord of Luxury : Gonti fills the same spot on the curve as Hostage Taker. There's less tempo swing and card advantage to it than Taker, but is more useful in the Control matchups (where Taker just don't have any targets but our own creatures). Could be 2 in SB, or 1 in SB and 1 in main deck (instead of 1 Taker) if Control decks rise in popularity.
• Lost Legacy : Pure SB material, but true hate vs Combo and Control decks.
• Baral's Expertise : Huge tempo swing in our favor vs Aggro and Midrange if we bounce 2-3 of their creatures and 0-1 Hostage Taker (if we don't have it already in hand).
• Ipnu Rivulet : Graveyard filler (to feed The Scarab God and Liliana, Death's Majesty or just to add Champion of Wits to the pool of options).

I haven't played this deck on MODO a lot since Brad Nelson won the GP with Temur Energy since I don't like the MU, but here's my MWP spreadsheet from Leagues and premier events I played in August:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1paKruFAeq2n3e3ltKD92c1yaPN-Xx_spEG2QQ1sugb8/edit?usp=sharing

Played this deck on a small Saturday showdown as well. I ended up getting second, so I went 2-1.

1st round played Grixis control, we only played game one into time since he kept having a hand of counter spells. Commit//Memory helped me remove Nicol Bolas and make sure he didn't draw it nest turn. It was a really grindy game and the only reason I won is because when he played Bolas a second time he used his +1 discard effect instead of the minus for damage. Since it was only one game I'm not sure how the sideboard matchup was.

2nd round I played against RB aggro with Ahn Crop Crasher and the 4/1 that gives a second combat. I ended up going 2-0 against him. 1st game was really close with me at one point going to 3 life. He started out with a great curve but I had one mainboard Engulf the shores to stop his initial assault. I tutored for Aetherflux and gradually gained life with the spells I drew and cracked implement of improvements until I drew a Paradoxical Outcome right in time. Game 2 wasn't very close, I opened with Aetherflux and Metallic Rebuke after sideboarding some counters and curved pretty perfectly. He played an abrade on turn 3 or 4 but I countered and he couldn't draw anything else and I just won after combo-ing.

3rd round I lost to mono black eldrazi control wierdness goodstuff? Anyway it was brew, although a pretty good one since this guy won the tourney. He started the beatdown game one and I just drew a hand full of artifacts with no spells to play. I played a couple glint nest cranes to stave off the attacks for a bit, but the artifacts they fetched didn't help me. Game 2 he drew his singleton Disposes opening hand. I had negate in hand as I anticipated a fair amount of deck and hand control coming in, but I was tapped out on turn 3 after playing Statuary when he names Aetherflux with Disposes and proceeds to win. I could have left up the mana for negate, but I feel like I made the right play, despite regretting it.

I really like this deck and will be sad to see it go when the format rotates (Unless there is some secret sauce that releases in Ixalan)

a pretty sick friendly league I just played: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/165938143