Welcome Magic lovers!
Now that the final few cards from Outlaws of Thunder Junction have been revealed, its time to begin the exciting process of crafting new homes in the Standard format for the most powerful and promising of the bunch. Without further adieu, let's go over some spicy new Standard deck lists to get your creative juices flowing! Sideboards will be omitted until we see how the Standard meta game may shift once the new set drops. Credit for the deck lists goes to Will Erker.
Jeskai Prowess
Our first entry is a powerful looking Jeskai midrange deck built around prowess creatures such as Monestary Swiftspear and the new Lilah, Undefeated Slickshot, as well as the seriously underplayed, Narset, Enlightened Exile, which not only gives all of your creatures prowess, but also fuels their newfound ability by flashing back spells from the graveyard when Narset attacks.
Lilah, Undefeated Slickshot is excellent here, letting potent, multicolored instants like Lightning Helix and Slick Sequence be cast more than once in order to get an additional turn of prowess triggers, do a pile of extra damage to the opponent's face, or just generate a bunch of value by killing the opponent's creatures and drawing its controller a few cards.
Taii Wakeen, Perfect Shot is another powerful addition from Outlaws of Thunder Junction that ensures the deck's three and five-damage removal can be pumped up to either kill larger threats like an opposing Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, or simply provide that extra reach to burn the opponent down to zero life. Taii Wakeen is also capable of some neat tricks in this deck, like turning End the Festivities into a one-sided sweeper that also draws a card, which is obviously very sweet.
The real reason a deck like this finally has a chance to be viable in Standard is the addition of the new fast-lands, Spirebluff Canal and Inspiring Vantage, which are a must-play in this three-color, aggressive list to ensure it can cast its gold cards and double-colored spells in a timely fashion.
Selesnya Counters
The two main reasons this deck seems like a great shell to build upon are the two new additions to Standard, Bristly Bill, Spine Sower and Ornery Tumblewagg. Both of these cards not only enable the +1/+1 counter proliferation that the deck is trying to exploit, but also become payoffs for generating a large number of said counters.
Another card that has a lot of potential in the deck is Seraphic Steed. A flying, first striking, lifelinking 2/2 is great for only two mana, and despite its saddle ability being a little bit expensive to activate, when all the other creatures in the deck are already pumping each other up, having a four-power body ends up being a relatively easy hurdle to clear. New addition, Wylie Duke, Atiin Hero pairs perfectly with the Steed as its big enough to saddle it while also drawing a card each time it does. The payoff once saddled is obviously enormous, and with a Skrelv, Defector Mite or Melira, the Living Cure to protect it, this pretty pony becomes a very scary threat.
One last note about this list: none of the cards (except the channel lands), will disappear in a couple of months when Standard does finally rotate, meaning this deck loses nothing while also having everything to gain from whatever powerful cards eventually arrive in Bloomburrow.
Jund Legends
Our next list is jamming as many powerful legendary creatures into it as possible, while also creating a fun little combo finish. Playing a lot of legendary cards in a deck can get awkward, as drawing multiple copies without a way to discard them for value presents a problem. This deck, however, has a use for extraneous legends: get them in the graveyard via Liliana of the Veil, Bitter Triumph or even Old Rutstein, then reanimate them with the new Rakdos Joins Up. This not only brings back a legendary creature with a permanent +2/+2 buff, but can also do a massive amount of damage to the opponent as they struggle to kill off the recurring stream of legends.
The deck is also capable of a titanic, one-time explosion of damage with the right sequence of cards. Try to envision an opening like turn two Ruby, Daring Tracker, into a turn three Liliana of the Veil +1 in order to discard Yargle and Multani. On turn four, Ruby allows one to cast Rakdos Joins Up on the Yargle and Multani in the graveyard, which comes back as a twenty-power creature, which then gets sacrificed via the -2 ability on the Liliana of the Veil that's in play (yes, you can target yourself), dealing a clean, twenty damage to the opponent. Yikes.
Mono-Black Combo
Last week I wrote about the power of one of the new Outlaws of Thunder Junction spells with spree, Rush of Dread, and how deadly its third mode can be when combined with Bloodletter of Aclazotz. Well, now we have a preliminary shell to build off of.
The combo pieces are all here, with the full four copies of Rush of Dread and Bloodletter of Aclazotz, as well as Insatiable Avarice to find them and put them on top. New addition, Caustic Bronco lets one draw the card they tutor to the top, and if its saddled, one can find a Shadow of Mortality to leave on the top in order to deal fifteen damage to the opponent when the Bronco attacks.
Backed up by powerful black removal spells Cut Down and Go for the Throat, as well as a suite of solid black creatures like Graveyard Trespasser, Lord Skitter, Sewer King and Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, this deck definitely doesn't need to combo off in order to kill. A smooth, single-color mana base means we can even try to squeeze in a couple of utility lands, but be careful not to force in too many, as the black mana requirements in the deck are very heavy.
Mono-Black Skeletons
Since many players really love playing the evil necromancer role in Magic: the Gathering, here's another mono-black deck for Standard, although this one is operating a bit differently from our last list. It's skeletons!
That's right, the deck is built around the many creatures with the skeleton type, such as the new Tinybones, the Pickpocket and Forsaken Miner, which are quite powerful alongside Corpses of the Lost, as neither one comes in tapped, allowing them to attack immediately with a Corpses in play.
With plenty of cheap beaters at one and two mana, Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor is the perfect card to curve into, allowing the pilot to keep the card draw, and threats, flowing. Deep-Cavern Bat has already proven how crucial it is in almost every matchup by disrupting the opponent's plans as well as being an evasive body, which is a perfect way to keep drawing cards with Gix.
Only one Gisa, the Hellraiser may seem odd here as its another way to pump up all of our skeletons, but with four Case of the Stashed Skeleton in the deck, it's a trivial matter to tutor up a silver bullet like the Gisa, or even Aclazotz, Deepest Betrayal, in the later turns.
Filling out the deck with powerful black removal spells as well as a playset of Mishra's Foundry in the mana base for extra reach and insulation against sweepers, leaves us with a very potent list that almost certainly deserves to be tuned further.
Naya Storm (the Festival)
When Terror of the Peaks was reprinted in Outlaws of Thunder Junction, the first card that many Standard players immediately thought of was Storm the Festival. The last time this terrifying dragon was in Standard, we were using Genesis Ultimatum to slam both it and one or two other large threats directly into play, triggering the Terror and often killing the opponent on the spot. While the Ultimatum is no longer legal in Standard, Storm the Festival performs enough of a respectable imitation that its definitely worth building around. The key is to find the right number of creatures that cost five mana or less with potent enter-the-battlefield abilities.
New addition, Outcaster Trailblazer, allows the deck to set up some very swingy combo turns with its ability to plot itself. Roxanne, Starfall Savant and Railway Brawler are also perfect in this deck due to their excellent enter-the-battlefield abilities and casting cost of five.
Combine any of these cards with powerful praetor, Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines and things start to snowball very quickly. In fact, having an Elesh Norn in play and resolving a Storm the Festival is almost always going to be game-ending, especially if one hits a Terror of the Peaks.
Glimpse the Core, Topiary Stomper and a single The Irencrag provide mana ramp and fixing, while Blossoming Tortoise not only ramps, but also puts the crucial Storm the Festival in the graveyard to be flashed back later.
A very swingy, very explosive deck that can easily snowball out of control should definitely be taken seriously in Standard.
Those are all the decks we have to cover today, but join us next week as we delve deeper into the upcoming Standard format as Outlaws of Thunder Junction takes over!
