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Main » Articles » A Whole New World

A Whole New World

Ali Aintrazi
Posted on May 12, 2017
 Reddit

Felidar Guardian is gone and I feel like we are in Agrabah. Mardu Vehicles is still oppressive and arguably the best deck in the format but we are still in a whole new world. Anything is possible! Well, not anything, but a lot is. My only fear is that Aetherworks Marvel will establish itself as the new combo deck in the format and Mardu as the best overall aggressive/midrange deck in the format. I really don’t want to go back to that. That being said, Aetherworks Marvel tends to be cold toward hyper aggressive decks and control decks. Today we are going to be talking about control, Aetherworks Marvel, a New Perspectives deck that wins on the back of Approach of the Second Sun, and a Bant Planeswalker deck. Let’s explore some sweet decks in this new world shall we?

First up!

U/R Control ? Amonkhet Standard | Ali Aintrazi

I really like ur Control right now mostly because of Magma Spray. Magma Spray is a great card against aggro but it’s especially good against Scrapheap Scrounger and Zombies. Even if you must Magma Spray a Toolcraft Exemplar early it’s okay. It might not be the Scrapheap Scrounger you want to hit but at least they can’t exile the Toolcraft Exemplar anymore to bring back Scrapheap Scrounger. Playing Red also gives us access to Harnessed Lightning and Sweltering Suns. While you wouldn’t normally play an Anger of the Gods type of card main deck, the fact that Sweltering Suns has cycling makes it reasonable. Against matchups where you don’t need it or the battlefield is in okay shape, you can just cycle it away so it’s never an awful top deck in the late game.

The deck doesn’t have very many win conditions. It just has four Torrential Gearhulks and four Wandering Fumarole. So, keep that in mind while playing. You do have two Commit // Memory so you can cast Memory and re-buy all your threats if your opponent happens to deal with them. Don’t forget that Torrential Gearhulk can target Commit // Memory in the graveyard and you can choose to cast the Memory half at instant speed.

You might be wondering why I’m running Glimmer of Genius of Hieroglyphic Illumination. Sure, I can cycle Hieroglyphic Illumination but Glimmer of Genius is much more powerful and plays extremely well with Harnessed Lightning and Aether Hub. Even if I wasn’t playing Aether Hub or Harnessed Lightning I’d still play Glimmer of Genius. Glimmer is just a great card that helps you find whatever you need in any situation.

Let’s have a look at a less fair deck.

Temur Marvel ? Amonkhet Standard| Ali Aintrazi

Aetherworks Marvel has been around for a while. Before the Felidar Guardian ban it mostly just saw play in Saheeli combo decks. Now that the cat is dead, we don’t have anything to fear by tapping out. Temur has some of the best energy cards in its colors and is the go to for most Aetherworks Marvel decks. In case you don’t know the deck just tried to build a bunch of energy and then play Aetherworks Marvel to hit Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger. In case you get stuck with big daddy Ulamog in your hand, the deck is also playing two Nissa's Renewals that will make casting Ulamog from your hand a lot easier. The deck can also just win off random creature beatdown. Rogue Refiner is still a 3/2 and Whirler Virtuoso can make an army of 1/1 Thopters at instant speed to kill your opponent in the air.

The toughest matchup for this deck tends to be heavy control decks which is why we have some countermagic alongside the full playset of Tireless Trackers and three Hermit of the Natterknolls to combat spells being played on our turn. What’s cool about the Hermit is even if they don’t play a spell on your turn he will flip. After he transforms into Lone Wolf of the Natteknolls your opponent will think twice before countering any spell you cast on your own turn.

If you want to cast Ulamog but don’t want to ramp into him then this deck is for you. Heck, if you just like having free wins sometimes then this deck is also for you.

Next up I want to talk about the new combo deck on the block.

New Perspectives Combo ? Amonkhet Standard | Ali Aintrazi

This deck may look clunky and janky from first glance but I promise you it combos pretty darn quick. Think of New Perspectives as a Scapeshift but instead of having to fill your deck with four Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle and ramp spells you just have to fill it with good cycling cards and an Approach of the Second Sun.

How does the combo work?

Ideally you want to cast Gift of Paradise into New Perspectives. Once you do that you will be able to cycle your entire deck. Shefet Monitor and Vizier of Tumbling Sands net you mana with New Perspectives out as well as drawing your cards. Eventually you’ll draw a Shadow of the Grave and you can buy back all the cards you cycled to cycle them all again. You’ll be able to generate enough mana to cast Approach of the Second Sun then cycle more things, redraw it, and then cast Approach of the Second Sun again to win the game. Gift of Paradise buys us some time by gaining life and makes it easier to cast things like Sweltering Sun and Fumigate / Archfiend of Ifnir after board.

After playing the deck a couple of times you’ll get the hang of it. It’s not as complicated as it looks or sounds. A very fun and powerful deck. It also happens to be very cheap so if you’re building on a budget, I’d highly recommend it.

Last but not least I’d like to give you updates to my Bant Planeswalker deck.

Bant Walkers ? Amonkhet Standard | Ali Aintrazi

This deck is trying to play a lot of Planeswalkers and slowly take over the game by activating them all every turn to bury your opponent in card advantage. The rest of the deck is aimed at protecting your Planeswalkers. Things like Haze of Pollen, Heart of Kiran, Cast Out and Fumigate all do a great job. On top of that even some of your Planeswalkers protect your Planeswalkers! That has to be a meme right? The best advice I can give you is to keep as many of your walkers alive as possible and remember that upticking them is a subtle way to protect them.

The board plan is to usually bring in the angel package since your opponent should be taking out the vast majority of their removal. What’s sweeter than winning the game with a bunch of Planeswalker activations? Casting Bruna, the Fading Light to form Brisela, Voice of Nightmares!

I hope one of these decks appeals to you. If not, you can always just play Mardu! Thanks for tuning and reading. I’ll catch you all next time!

Much love,

Ali Aintrazi

@AliEldrazi on Twitter

Amonkhet is now available at CoolStuffInc.com!

TAGS articles, metagame, constructed, standard, ali aintrazi, amonkhet standard

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